“Claudia Rankine's Citizen comes at you like doom. It's the best note in the wrong song that is America. Its various realities-'mistaken' identity, social racism, the whole fabric of urban and suburban life-are almost too much to bear, but you bear them, because it's the truth. Citizen is Rankine's Spoon River Anthology, an epic as large and frightening and beautiful as the country and various emotional states that produced it.” CountryStatesWholeRealityAmericaBeautifulSongSocialToo MuchIdentityEmotionalBearsCitizensRacismRiversNotesVariousFrighteningFabricUrbanEpicMistakenDoomSpoonsAnthologyClaudiaMistaken Identity Author:Hilton Als
“Americans love marriage too much. We rush into mariage with abandon, expecting a micro-Utopia on earth. We pile all our needs onto it, our expectations, neuroses, and hopes. In fact, we've made marriage into the panda bear of human social institutions: we've loved it to death.” NeedsHumansMadeFactsEarthSocialToo MuchBearsExpectationsInstitutionsAbandonExpectingUtopiaNeurosisMarriage LoveSocial InstitutionsPandas Author:Barbara Ehrenreich
“Why did the consensus of Christian churches not only accept these astonishing views but establish them as the only true form of Christian doctrine? . . . these religious debates - questions of the nature of God, or of Christ - simultaneously bear social and political implications that are crucial to the development of Christianity as an institutional religion. In simplest terms, ideas which bear implications contrary to that development come to be labeled as 'heresy'; ideas which implicitly support it become 'orthodox.'” IdeasChristianFormPoliticalReligionSocialTermChristChurchReligiousViewsAcceptingChristianitySupportDevelopmentBearsContraryDebateDoctrineOrthodoxCrucialSimplestConsensusAstonishingImplicationsHeresyChristian ChurchChristian Doctrine Author:Elaine Pagels
“Prostitution is the most hideous of the afflictions produced by the unequal distribution of the world's goods; this infamy stigmatizes the human species and bears witness against the social organization far more than does crime.” WorldHumansDoeSocialCrimeBearsOrganizationSpeciesWitnessGoodsAfflictionDistributionProstitutionHideousHuman SpeciesInfamySocial Organization Author:Flora Tristan
“Many of us who read the literature of social science as laymen are conscious of being admitted at a door which bears the watchword "scientific objectivity" and of emerging at another door which looks out upon a variety of projects for changing, renovating, or revolutionizing society. In consequence, we feel the need of a more explicit account of how the student of society passes from facts to values or statements of policy.” NeedsFeelsLooksFactsValuesLiteratureSocialDoorsPolicyStudentsBearsProjectsConsciousConsequenceAccountsStatementsVarietyEmergingObjectivityExplicitSocial ScienceLayman Book:In defense of tradition: collected shorter writings of Richard M. Weaver, 1929-1963 Source: In defense of tradition: collected shorter writings of Richard M. Weaver, 1929-1963
“As the saffron tints and crimson flushes of morn herald the coming day, so the social and political advancement which woman has already gained bears the promise of the rising of the full-orbed sun of emancipation. The result will be not to make home less happy, but society more holy.” HomePoliticalSocialResultsSunBearsHolyPromiseRisingWomens RightsAdvancementEmancipationSuffrageCrimsonWoman SuffrageSaffron Author:Frances Harper